Janine’s blog

Just hearing about a colleague’s recent study tour and some key UK websites relevant to teacher professional associations

Training and Development Agency for Schools (TDA) - the national agency responsible for the training and development of the school workforce. It plays a central role in supporting the workforce to help children and young people meet the outcomes of the Every Child Matters agenda.

Teacher training resource bank - managed and run by a consortium of 4 partners from the education and ICT sectors and supported by TDA

National College for School Leadership provides programs to support new and emerging leaders. its work is informed by the Secretary of State’s targets and objectives.

   Teachers TV

Listening to Margaret Throsby interview on ABC Classic FM. She is interviewing  Dr Jim McNamara,  Professor of Public Communication at the University of Technology Sydney and Director of the Australian Centre for Public Communication, on the topic of  emergent media. It is interesting to listen to such interviews during the day and realise that there is still a need for education at a really simple level.  His conversation does a good job of this as one would expect from his position title!

Some paraphrased snippets:

“…..this gets to some fundamental beliefs such as ‘Do you believe in participatory communication’…..

“….It’s not just new media that are emergent but rather that existing media are changing eg newspapers online, podcasting, RSS feeds……”

“What are the filters so that people know what is accurate?”
“This is one of the challenges….that is why there is a continuing need for editors, journalists….but the public is making it clear that they are tired of the gatekeepers……

 http://www.abc.net.au/classic/throsby/stories/s2262283.htm

I’ve returned from my OS travels and am easing back into real life via two weeks school holidays.  My travel blog  is almost complete and has been great fun to use as a way to play with some new tools (well new to me anyway). It’s c-o-l-d here in Tassie even compared to London at present so I am taking the luxury of reading and listening in bed for a while.

I’m looking forward to playing with the new Edublogs features that have come with version 3.0 - thank you Edublogs for a great birthday present!

I am listening to Margaret Throsby’s morning interview with Dr Jim McNamara on the topic of emergent media (see next post for more).

Pictures of Practice In Schools (LS-South East schools) http://popis.edublogs.org/

Windows into the classroom (LS-South schools) http://winclass.edublogs.org/

Background

The Tasmanian Education Department has undergone massive restructure in recent years (and it is an ongoing work in progress). One of the elements of the restructure is that the central statewide bureacracy has now been transformed into 4 regional ”Learning Services”. So we have Learning Services South, Learning Services South East, Learning Services North and Learning Services North West. Each makes their own decisions about various support structures depending on the needs of the local schools.The two Learning Services for the South of the State have decided for the time being to continue having a full time person whose role is to provide ICT Professional Learning services to schools, again in response to school identified needs.

These two educators (Ros and Julie) have been working in such roles for many years. Last year they both decided to start documenting their observations of teacher practice in schools via  blogs with monthly postings. What I like about this use of blogs is that the unique opportuniries they have to observe classroom practice are being documented and shared. That knowledge (dare I suggest wisdom?) is preserved regardless of the longevity or otherwise of their current jobs. Of course the other side of the coin is that such writing in the public domain requires a high level of personal awareness of privacy, copyright and professional ethics else (to quote a learned colleague) the excrement can hit the rotating device big time.

In their own words from a posting to the local ICT-learning email discussion list …..

“Hello everyone,

During 2007, Julie Fielding and I both kept a blog relating to the work that we do in southern schools, and we will be continuing our blogs this year.

We each make a new posting approximately once a month and choose a focus that reflects what is happening in our schools at the time.

We hope it provides teachers and principals with general information about what is happening in the ICT area, along with examples of local teachers using ICT to enhance learning for their students, as well as giving them the opportunity to ask questions, share their own experiences etc. using the ‘Comments’ facility at the end of each posting.

Here are the links to the 2 blogs so you can have a look:

Pictures of Practice In Schools (LS-South East schools) http://popis.edublogs.org/

Windows into the classroom (LS-South schools) http://winclass.edublogs.org/

If you would like to subscribe to the blogs and be automatically notified each month when there is new material posted on the blog, use the ‘Subscribe by email’ facility on the right hand side of the pages, or use an RSS feed if you would prefer.

[copied from http://lyris.education.tas.gov.au:8080/read/messages?id=40717]

to be checked out - recommended on aamt email discussion list  - a teacher organizing his classroom to enhance learning. The web site also includes links to a number of supporting documents.

http://www.edutopia.org/math-social-activity-sel-video#comment-26073_

I found out today, with great sadness, that Marie Jasinski died on Monday 21 January. I first came across Marie in 1997 when I was starting up the VECO project and she was managing the LearnScope project. Although our audiences and purposes were different, there was much commonality in the field of online community and running online events. At the 1999 Net*Working online conference, she played the zany, offbeat, bizarre role of Sister Marie Psychic in the Alcazar (solver of all your problems). Marty Cielens was the Moet Poet, many others hung out in the Alcazar and I decided to be the self-appointed archivist.   As was typical of much of her work, this was a fun and off-beat way to explore new territory but with serious learning in mind. Not long after this we collaborated to experiment with using technology to bring a face to face workshop to a remote audience - it did not work so well but we learned heaps. So a professional and personal relationship developed over time. While visiting Adelaide for a conference a few years ago, we met up and went to an Adelaide Fringe Festival event in the famous Spiegeltent. She brought along the new man in her life who turned out to be none other than Marty, the Moet Poet from the Alcazar.  She was my mentor for my Flexible Learning Leader year and how insightful, inspirational and motivational she was. 

In early 2007 she found out that she was seriously unwell and her approach to that, as to everything in her life, was to focus on the positive, to make the most of every moment and share her love with family and friends.  She and Marty married, had some travelling adventures then moved home to Hobart in December 2007. Though I spoke to her, it was not meant to be that we would spend any more time together.  The notice in today’s Mercury reads:

Jasinski, Marie Louise

Died peacefully at Hobart on January 21, 2008. Much loved wife of Martin Cielens. Beloved daugheter of Dorothy Jasinski and  Leonard Jasinski (dec.) Cherished sister of Jenny and John. Much loved sister-in-law of Janet Plater, Viesturs and Andrew Cielens, Kym Tilgals and Michelle Marsh, and daughter in law of Tatjana Tilgals. Adored “Auntie Rie” of Sam, Grace and Max Jasinski. To all of us, a friend, companion and guide; someone who wove webs of joy and adventure. An exceptional person who will be deeply missed yet lives in all of us.

Marie leaves behind a rich legacy to the world of flexible learning, innovation, change and generally operating effectively in the 21st century. She was extremely proud of her final piece of professional work.

Some snippets of her digital footprint…..

• 1998 Teaching and learning styles that facilitate  online learning - research project led by Marie
• 1999 Sister Marie and the Alcazar - an early foray into role playing (look out for the Spitting Camel)
• 1999 Online learning - delivery truck, construction site or introduction agency (includes audio file - an early webcast)
• 2000 Virtual games for real learning - conference paper co-authored with Sivasailam “Thiagi” Thiagarajan
• 2001 E-games: Improvisation through open platform design - conference paper
• 2002 Sister Marie reaches the summit - a summary of role play and simulation
• 2002 The Zen Of Being An Effective ‘Mod’ In Online Role-Play Simulations - paper jointly authored with Albert Ip
• 2003 Notes on Inspired Minds workshop - Harnessing Your Power To Innovate, Lead and Change - by Janet Burstall
• 2004 Educhaos series - out of control and thriving! - a series of 7 online events facilitated by Marie in the Australian Flexible Learning community
• 2005 Background to the Australian Flexible Learning Community - describes Marie’s role in the early days
• 2005 Robert Woog, Robby Weatherley, Marie Jasinski talk at Austafe2005 - see conversation after blog posting
• 2006 Innovate and integrate: Embedding innovative practices research - commissioned applied research
• 2006 Life Based Learning: A strength based approach to capability development - research collaboration with Maret Staron and Robbie Weatherley
• 2007 Marty and Marie’s blog
• 2008 Stephen Downes’ tribute
• 2008 Nancy White’s tribute
• 2008 Albert Ip’s tribute - lots of links to video clips of Marie talking about role play
• 2008 Carole McCulloch’s tribute - photostory from Marie and Marty’s wedding
• 2008 Australian Flexible Learning Leaders’ (FLL) tributes

The poem and other sentiments expressed so far in the FLL tributes really capture the spirit of Marie. Anyone she touched professionally she also influenced personally. Her approach to life shone through - she embodied the concept of living in the moment and always with joy, humour, insight and understanding of the human condition.

Janine Bowes FLL 2004

• 25 Jan 2008  Special tribute held online - recording and summary available
• Feb 2008 Thiagi’s tribute
• Mar 2008 Celebration held in Adelaide (Michael Coghlan blog)

Vale special friend.

I am fortunate to be attending a ten day Summer School for Science teachers being held at Flinders University in Adelaide.  I have set up a separate summer school blog  as the focus is somewhat different (though related) to this one.

“This research will identify the key features of successful and promising personalising learning strategies, supported by exemplars of excellent practice. The project seeks to respond to the following questions:

What are the key characteristics of excellent and successful personalised learning experiences through the use of digital technologies? …..”

According to the website, the field research for this project is winding up now (December 2007) and the report will be out in March 2008.
Read more on the website

The latest Australian Flexible Learning framework online event kicked off today. Whilst the site requires login, a public facing e-Show nTell blog  is also happening. I believe a recording will be available and I look forward to that.

e-learning with an emphasis on learning - Ron Oliver

 I was unable to attend Ron Oliver’s opening keynote but the slides are available on the event blog together with some screenshots (1 and 2) of the audience interaction. I really like his 3 circles description of learning design - the intersection of

• learning tasks
• learning resources
• learning supports

Naturally each of these is a deep study in itself and he goes into exploration of each. 

[As posted to ict-learning email discussion list 30-Sep-07 http://lyris.education.tas.gov.au:8080/read/messages?id=39489]

I have just finished listening to a presentation titled  Can MOODLE become more SUPPLE? from the New Zealand Moodle Moot which finished yesterday (mentioned on Stephen Downes’ OLDaily e-newsletter).

The presentation discusses the need for traditional LMS/VLE systems (which are essentially Web 1.0 technologies) to move on and embrace Web 2.0 and thus morph into PLEs - Personalised Learning Environments. The presenter makes a case for Moodle being ahead of the game in this regard because of its open philosophy. Regardless of your views in the LMS wars, the discussion about learning design and how educational thinking needs to move on so that student use of web 2.0 is acknowledged and made use of, is great food for thought. The presentation is in Slideshare so you see the slides and hear the audio.

Moodlemoot website is at http://www.elearning.org.nz/ One of the most interesting slides in the presentation is one taken from another place. It shows a future possibility where educational organisations focus on providing the infrastructure and tools to collect learning evidence from whatever sources the student chooses to use.  See visual representation of this